I racked my beer again yesterday and checked the specific gravity. It went down only another point in the last week, but it tastes really good. It will still be very drinkable, just not as high of an alcohol content as it is supposed too. Actually that might make it a good summer beer! It is still around 4% ABV. I plan on bottling it next weekend. I think I am going to put a little yeast nutrient and yeast energizer in the fermenter today to see if that might help things along a bit.

We also racked our mead and checked its SG. It is at about 8% alcohol now! We drank the 6 ounce sample we needed to check the SG and it was so good we pulled another glass to drink. If it tastes that good now I think it will be amazing in a few months. It has a beautiful light straw color. We used Champaign yeast because we wanted a dry wine rather than a sweet one, and the Champaign taste is coming through nicely. We were going to make half of this batch still and half sparkling, but we think we might make it all sparkling now. Still not 100% sure yet, but that's what makes it fun.

After we took care of our 10 gallons of deliciousness we took the Two Brother's Brewery tour. I've done it once before with my parents but Amy had not taken it. Afterwards we were sitting in the tap house and I was trying a Cane & Ebel and think I have fallen in love with Simcoe hops. They are a fairly new variety introduced in 2000. I haven't seen them at my local homebrew shop and I think right now they are available mostly to commercial brewers. If I can't find them for my next batch I think I will try Cascade hops because I have read people describe Simcoe hops as Cascade on steroids.

The brewery also has a homebrew shop and I picked up 3.3 pounds of amber liquid malt extract for my next batch of beer and Amy got a large can of sterilized peach puree for an upcoming batch of mead. I think for the other half of the malt in my next beer I will use a powdered malt extract, but I don't know if I want that to be an amber or a light. I still have to do some more research. I am thinking about buying a little bit more than I need for the batch and use the extra as priming sugar rather than corn sugar.

If you describe the homebrew process to somebody it sounds like a lot of work and complexity, and it is if you had to do it all at one time. But because brewing and racking and bottling all happen on different days separated each by several weeks it is really not that bad. I actually look forward to each process. Each process takes about two hours from start to finish. Brew day probably takes a little longer because you have to boil your wort for one hour, but that is more just relaxing than actually working.

I had to go into work today for a little bit to check on a database that had been updated yesterday, and Amy is in Kansas to see a patient for the day. I am going to start some laundry, put away some brewing gear from yesterday, and do some puttering yard work. Don't know if I will cut the grass, but I plan on at least spraying and/or digging some weeds, pick up dog poop, light pruning, and maybe organize the garage a little bit. My aquarium has not had a partial water change in WAY too long. I should do that today too. Oh yeah, a bike ride would also be a good idea. The weather here is perfect today.